The Love We Think We Deserve
by Trusted Trouble
Summary: Written for the Quidditch League practice round. The story of what happened on the night of Helena Ravenclaw's death.
**A/N: Written for the Quidditch League practice round.**

 **Task: To write about Ravenclaw's diadem**

 **Prompts: (word) happy, (word) freedom, (quote) "We accept the love we think we deserve," - The Perks of Being a Wallflower**

 **Word Count without author's note: 1,300**

* * *

She ran. Brambles ensnared her legs, trying to trip her up, trying to make her fall, trying to stop her from running but still she ran, letting them tear at her skin and dress instead; her once beautiful silver dress, now nothing but mud-stained rags barely covering her shivering body. She ran faster, fuelled by a fear that thumped through her bones, that raced down her spine, that consumed her thoughts. Every breath of wind was a curse whistling through the trees; every soft bird call was a harsh whisper for her to turn back, head home; every rustle in the undergrowth was a snake, or a tiger, or a bear or a wolf or a dragon ready to rip her apart, tear out her throat-

"HELENA!"

Letting out a strangled sob the girl nearly collapsed to the forest floor yet somehow managed to continue, her feet smacking the ground in time with the unsteady rhythm of her heart; the rhythm that pounded hard against the cage of her ribs, that served crimson blood to her starving muscles.

She ran. By her side, her left hand was cold. The sharp metal of the twisted crown digging its crystals into her palm. Oh, how she _hated_ that diadem!

It'll make you _cleverer_ , she'd said. It'll make you _wiser_ , she'd said. Wear it and you can be _just like me_. Just as _clever_ , just as _wise_ , just as _powerful_ , just as important and famous and wealthy – LIES! Because no one could ever be as good as Rowena Ravenclaw. No one, not even her own daughter-

"HELENA!"

The shouts hunted her through the dense forest, drawing nearer every second, biting at her heels, snapping at the ends of the wild hair that stretched out behind her, dancing to the same beat as her heart and feet.

"Helena, please."

The calls came quieter now and that terrified her ever the more. He was drawing closer. Should've known it would be him who found her, the only one who could keep up, the only one able to track her down.

The Baron, as cold as the starless night on her skin, as furious as the hidden currents that boiled and raged underneath the skin of a calm ocean.

And he'd found her. She'd run and he'd found her. Of course he'd found her.

"Stop running," he pleaded, so close she could feel his breath on her neck. "Please," he pleaded, reaching out a hand to grab her wrist. "Come back," he pleaded-

"NO!" And finally Helena fell, no longer able to run.

He was there in a instant, pinning her down, pressure on her chest, nails in her arms.

"GET OFF!" After too long gasping for a breath without a drop to drink, her voice, once lovely, was harsh, nails on a blackboard. Wild eyes burning with insanity fixed themselves on the rugged face above. "I won't! I WON'T GO BACK!"

"Please," he pleaded. "The Lady's ill-"

"I DON'T CARE," Helena screamed at him, tears cleansing her face of dust and mud as she thrashed about on the forest floor, her mother's precious diadem still clenched tightly in her hand. "SHE CAN DIE, I DON'T CARE, I DON'T- I don't – I -" she fizzled out with a heart-breaking sob, the emotions that had been surging through her veins ebbing away.

Sensing the end of her struggling, the Baron released his grip. "Come back," he said once more, brushing aside a loose tear on her pale cheek.

Helena took a shaky breath, gazing past him, up at the blank expanse of cloudy night sky. "I can't."

" _You can,_ " he insisted, the furious rage poking its way to the surface. He gritted his teeth. "You can."

"No," she sighed, so softy that the sound was like a shimmer on a breath of wind. "If I want my freedom, I can't be near her. I'm nothing like her, I'm-" tilting her head to the side, she looked down at the silver crown in her left hand. "-Useless. Even this thing doesn't work on me. It should've done something, anything. It should've..."

Helena fell quiet for a moment, frozen underneath the Baron's strong arms. Then she sat up, lightly pushing the Baron away from her as if in a daze, her oval eyes glued to a nearby tree. Her tangled hair brushed the ground as she shifted closer to a black, spherical hollow nestled in the bark, her grip on the diadem hardening so much so that the silver cut into her skin, creating little pearls of blood. "I can leave it here," she murmured to herself. "It'll never be discovered. My mother's wisdom, gone forever."

And, kneeling in front of the hollow with silent tears wetting her cheeks, the exhausted girl placed the diadem on a bed of moss, believing with all her troubled heart that it would stay there for eternity.

The Baron had no such plans; the Lady had demanded both the diadem and her daughter and her daughter and her diadem she would get. "Come back with me," he pleaded one last time, taking the girl's soft hand.

Still kneeling on the ground, she turned her wide eyes to his. "I cannot," she said, barely more than a whisper. "I'm not good enough for my mother. I can never make her happy, or proud-"

"Then come back for me," the Baron replied. "Please. You know I love you."

Helena's eyes dropped to the ground as he tucked a stray strand of hair behind her ear. "I do not deserve your love," she whispered.

"You do," he said, tilting her chin up so their eyes met again. "We accept the love we think we deserve, and I know you think you can never be like your mother but that doesn't matter; I love you for being you, not for being Lady Rowena. And for that, you deserve every morsel of my love."

For a glimmering moment, the Baron allowed his heart to swell in hope... and then she spoke.

"I don't."

Her voice was no longer soft and quiet, no longer the voice that belonged to the Helena he used to know, the one who would sing and dance and laugh under a bright sun. Her voice was rough and gravelly, like the harsh snarl of a wild animal before it sprung. "I DON'T," she screamed, the noise so sudden and jarring in the still air that it reverberated through the forest, causing birds to take flight and critters to scamper. She jumped to her feet, making to run again but she hadn't managed two steps before an immense force caught her around the waist, sending her tumbling to the ground.

"I won't let you leave," growled the Baron, his temper sparking as he tried to hold her down.

Helena let out an unearthly scream, biting, clawing, scratching, kicking, anything to escape. "GET OFF ME! GET OFF ME!" She screamed, again and again and again until her throat was so sore and so painful that she couldn't continue any longer.

"Come back," was all the Baron could say, over and over and over, perhaps believing that if he said it enough times that the girl beyond reason would see the light and follow him home.

She never did.

Ten feet away, from its throne of moss in its castle of bark, the diadem observed the struggle, the delicate hunk of metal caring not when the man, so full of rage and anger, drew his knife, snapping the girl's puppet strings; nor when the man, so full of remorse and sorrow, turned the knife upon himself. It didn't even care when, hundreds of years later, another boy, not much younger than the girl had been, found its hiding place.

Its journey since then is another story altogether.


End file.
